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Duskdancing and wingsmithing

THERE IS. NO. CONFLICT.

The latest email from the WFC organizers includes the following:

“World Fantasy Convention 2013 also does not operate on a gender “quota” or “parity” system for programming. Instead, our aim has been to match the best people available to us to the most appropriate panel topics, thereby creating an informed and enlightening discussion for your entertainment.”

I’m not having a pop at the people running WFC. Some of them are my friends, and they’re all doing a very difficult job that I personally wouldn’t touch with a tractor beam, and yet am very glad is being done. They’re doing it for no money, and they’re doing it mostly very well. I will buy them a pint in Brighton.

Still, their email contains a false opposition, and it’s not the only place I’ve heard it. So here’s my two cents:

There is no trade off between gender parity and ‘having the best people’. It’s not one or the other. The point of having a parity policy is in serviceof getting the best people on the most appropriate panel topics.

This is mostly because the ways in which people build profile in the industry, including reviews, awards nomination and previous convention panels, systematically over represent dudes. This in turn would lead you to believe that the ‘best person’ is a dude, far more often than the best person is actually a dude.

Parity is supposed to encourage programmers to dig a little deeper into who ‘the best person’ is, as much as it help address the bias in the first place.

The parity policy which I signed up for last year is this: If I get asked to be on a panel at a convention with more than 50% blokes* I’ll try to help the con runners find someone who was not a bloke who is ‘as, or more qualified than me.’ This would never lead to a panel that was less informed or enlightening than that initially planned.

Also, this policy doesn’t ask con-runners to do anything other than to let me step aside and help them look for someone else. Rather, the responsibility is pitched wider, at the participant. Personally, I think this a feature rather than a bug, since when you’re dealing with any systematic societal problem, it’s good to have as many people as possible acting to deal with it.

(Aside: this is one reason why I don’t think merely aiming at parity across the whole convention, rather than panel by panel, works. Convention-wide programming isn’t something most people can influence, so it lets us shrug and bounce responsibility back onto the con-runners. Another bigger reason is that it tends to lead to what my wife calls ‘Women in genre, aren’t they weird?’ panels. For more on this: Jess Haines.)

I know there’s a lot of points of view on this. A lot of people I respect disagree with me. I don’t expect everyone to immediately take a parity pledge. I don’t expect every convention to have one (although Nine Worlds recently showed you can have an ace con if you do). But actively trying for better representation on panels doesn’t have to come at a cost of them being ‘informing’ or ‘enlightening’, and we should stop pretending it does.

*With an even number of panellists, not counting moderators. Two out of three, or three out of five is ok.

UPDATE – Foz Meadows has crunched the numbers and found the following:

Taken with the email above, this suggests that the WFC organizers believe that ‘the best person’ out of those attending, is about twice as likely to be a man as a woman for any given panel topic, and around 30times as likely to be white. I wonder if they’d make of that.

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10 thoughts on “THERE IS. NO. CONFLICT.”

Absolutely agree. From job interviews to slush piles, there’s ample evidence that on average, men overestimate their competence and women underestimate. And the implicit message of the convention announcement is that they expect fewer women to be suitable panelists. Talk about lack of self-awareness!

We discovered at EightSquaredCon/Eastercon 2013 that one consequence of panel parity was a significant improvement on programme quality. To quote one (slightly inebriated) fan on Sunday night – “It’s really great – not just the same old faces saying the same old stuff.’

To expand on that a little, more than one long-standing con-panellist told me they had really enjoyed a panel because having new/different people in the mix prompted new thoughts and observations – really refreshing personally, and also good to feel they had given the audience good value for time/money as a result.

Our post-con report, with link to our pre-con post on why we were aiming for panel parity can be found here http://wp.me/p2mF0F-3N

Thank you for saying this. I have *some* reservations about panel parity, but I much prefer your proactive approach to the more performative one I’ve heard of from some quarters, where the bloke concerned stops the panel and gets a woman in the audience to take his place then and there (which seems to make it more about the individual bloke than the wider issue, and also assumes that the woman in the audience feels comfortable with being singled out like this).

Mostly, though, I’m wondering why on earth I’m going to WFC, because it feels like the least welcoming convention imaginable. I was excited about it when I first forked over my cash, over a year ago; no longer.

@Anne Yep – and Foz’s breakdown puts a number on that. The comms coming out of the con have been… suboptimal.

@Juliet Thanks for this. I can’t say I’m surprised. I didn’t get into the ways in which diversity can be a good thing *simpliciter* but it definitely is, in any discussion.

@Nic Thanks! In fairness, I think I know the guy who started out doing what you describe and I did nick the idea from him. It was fairly straightforward to pick it up and refine it, but he got the ball rolling, for me at least.

Re: WFC – it’ll be a hotel full of fun people hanging out and spending too much money in the bar and having a laugh, so I think it will be fun. I know what you mean though. It is exhausting being hectronized all the time.

@Jess Thanks!

I think natural selection will tell, if I’m honest. With cons like Nine Worlds popping up, natural selection’s going to tell eventually. It’ll just take a little time.

Are there any organizations that provide travel scholarships for women, people of color, and other underrepresented groups to attend conventions as panelists and pro guests? Inviting is only the beginning; women and pocs still have less money, on average and as a group.

Con or Bust has made a big difference in who attends WisCon in the past few years. Six years ago, WisCon had a dozen hardcore members of color. This past May there were at least four times that amount—many of them first time con-goers.

While initially focusing on WisCon, Con or Bust is now providing scholarships to many more cons. Details at the initial link (and hats off to Kate Nepveu for her tireless work).